Catch 4,562,371,523
by Devonius
Summary: Due to Fry's poor attention span his brain gets a new lease on life. Unfortunately, it remains to be seen if he'll be able to cope with it or even survive it long enough to try. There's always another catch. RATING WILL INCREASE TO M IN THE NEXT CHAPTER. See pre-chapter notes for more details.
1. Chapter 1

**Authors note: I've never attempted a Futurama fan fiction before, but a combination of boredom and it being canceled again lead me to take a swing at it. I welcome any and all feedback, positive and negative alike. Regardless of what you end up thinking, thank you for taking the time to read and I hope you are at least distracted by it. On with the show.**

**For reference, this story is set at some point in the currently airing episodes. EDIT: Added a section break I missed and changed some dialog based on a review. This thing won't let me use the small dash I wanted so now there's a gigantic line through the text.**

* * *

It wasn't quite noon yet and already Phillip J. Fry was baffled.

Professor Farnsworth had been angry about something when the bored delivery boy had wandered through the lab 20 minutes earlier. This part was not confusing to Fry as the Professor was frequently indignant about some thing or other. The old man had a tendency to lose his temper due to anything from having the quality of his news questioned to matters involving Fry, time travel and inadequate use of birth control. Whatever his motivations were, the Professor had sent Fry off to a storeroom to dig up his old F-Ray invention. It may have been his senility that caused him to forget how easily distracted his relative was by piles of futuristic items.

Fry stared intently at the mysterious object he was turning over in his hands. He'd dug the thing out of a box 15 minutes into his search and become oddly fascinated with it. It felt as though he should recognize it, but whatever word went to it wasn't coming to him. It was small, black, domed, with a warped ring around the base and an air of familiarity about it that was getting frustrating. He did at least like the ring, even if it was misshapen, but Amy said people didn't wear them anymore.

The thing had been in the Professors storeroom, so Fry concluded that it must be a doomsday device. It would explain the familiarity as his senile nephew had built lots of doomsday devices and other assorted glow-y stuff in the past. Fry felt that it was too bad the black things ring didn't glow. He rummaged through the box he'd found the object in one handed but nothing glowing or with lasers stuck to it seemed to be in there. Fry made to turn to the next un-rummaged box on the shelf when he noticed he was holding something in his other hand.

"Hey, a hat!" Fry said aloud. He wasn't sure why that felt like a revelation to him but he had a sneaking feeling that he should feel proud of himself. For lack of a better idea of what to do with it, he put the hat on his head.

A strange tingling feeling started on his scalp the instant the miniature hat touched his hair. The room tilted around him and the delivery boy swayed on the spot as the tingling was joined by a warm glow like sunlight at noon and a pungent whiff of cubes took a whirlwind tour through his nose. After a few seconds of swaying like a drunken sailor the room started to sober up and Fry rubbed his eyes dazedly.

"Man, what was I doing in here? Oh, right I was supposed to be finding that F-Ray for the Professor. I should be more careful digging through here. Who knows what crazy stuff he's keeping in storage?"

A quick glance around was all it took for Fry to spot the alphabetical labeling on the shelves and pick out the F-Ray. He carried the flashlight like device back out to the Professors laboratory where he and Amy were working and set it down on the workbench.

"Hey, Professor, I found the F-Ray for you!"

"He-whaa...? Oh, thank you, Fry. This ought to make those cybernetic termites reconsider holding out on their rent," The wizened mad scientist picked up the dangerously radioactive device and shuffled off with a malevolent snigger.

"That was fast," Amy commented. "Usually it takes two or three tries before you both remember what you're doing long enough to get anywhere."

"Eh," Fry shrugged. "I just noticed the new labels is all. Made things a _lot_ faster."

"Those have been there for years, Fry."

"What? No way. I'd definitely have noticed them before now. I'm gonna take my lunch break."

Fry opened the company fridge on autopilot a short time later and pulled out a Slurm. The sweet, green liquid was already pouring into his mouth when an image burst to the forefront of his mind, namely that of an immense, flaccid worm gulping down pound after pound of alien berries. His minds eye fixated on the lurid green fluid that squirted from the far end of the creatures reclining body to be funneled down into waiting cans, each one branded with the Slurm logo.

Fry's eyes went wide and he spat the "soda" into the sink.

"Bleagh! How do I _drink_ this stuff, knowing where it comes from?" Fry poured the rest of the beverage down the drain and tossed the can into the trash without a moments hesitation.

After washing the taste out of his mouth with some Buggalo milk, Fry walked out to the briefing room with a heaping bowl of Bachelor Chow in hand. The makes-its-own-gravy kibble was far from the best food he'd had since being frozen for a thousand years but it did have the benefit of being dirt cheap. He was halfway through the bowl by the time Leela dropped into the chair next to him.

"Hey, Fry."

"Hey, Leela. How's the maintenance work going?" Truthfully, a single glance at her was enough to make it obvious, even to Fry, that Leela was having a bad day. Her clothes were splattered with spots of engine grease and various liquids left behind by their last shipment as well as damp with sweat and soapy water. A stray scale or two had even managed to get stuck to her ponytail.

"Don't ask," Leela groaned. "I'm still finding scales and blood everywhere. I don't care _how_ much money that delivery was worth, I'm never flying a shipment of giant piranha lizards ever again."

"Tell me about it," Fry agreed. He reached over and flicked the scales off Leela's hair. "This is my third set of hands now, not counting the Robot Devils. Just once I'd like a chance to keep them until the warranty expires."

"You do seem to get things cut off a lot. I don't know how you managed before replacement body parts were invented."

"They hadn't invented most of what's happened to me yet either."

"Huh. That's actually a good point. By the way, would you mind if we didn't go out tonight? The way today is going I'm not going to be up to getting cleaned up enough for Elzar's."

A disappointed look settled onto Fry's face but he couldn't blame her for wanting to shelve their previous plans. The Planet Express ships interior looked worse than his bedroom ever had and, knowing his captain, she wasn't going to be satisfied until the ship was as clean as her apartment.

"That's okay, Leela." He dug his spoon into the remaining chow when an idea struck him. "Hey, Leela, you said you didn't feel like going out, right? But that's just because you'd have to get cleaned up, right? So, what if we just hung out at your place? We could order a pizza and you'd already be home when you got tired."

Leela was taken aback by her boyfriends curiously long attention span. "That's actually what I was going to suggest. How did you know?"

"I'unno. Guess I'm just having a lucky day."

Comfortable silence fell between them for several minutes as Fry scraped out the last few disintegrated bits of Bachelor Chow from the bottom of the bowl, while Leela fiddled with her wrist device between bites of sandwich.

"So, let me ax you something," Leela said at last, "What's with the hat?"

Fry gave her a blank stare. "What hat?"

"The one you're wearing. Where did you find it?"

Fry reached up, mouth open to reiterate his question when he felt that there was indeed a very small hat sitting on his head.

"Huh, I don't remember putting that on-nehurgleblagh!" The moment Fry's clumsy hand had dislodged the hat his body had objected by convulsing violently. His chair tipped backward, dumping him into a twitching heap on the floor.

Leela scrambled out of her chair and knelt down beside Fry in an instant. "Fry!? Fry, what's wrong!?" Say something!"

Fry managed a few further halfhearted gurgles before passing out entirely.

* * *

The Planet Express team all stood around the prostrate form of Fry that had been deposited on one of the Professors many work tables. Farnsworth himself was busy waving a humming gizmometer over Fry's head while mumbling indistinctly to himself.

"So, he just keeled over while you were talking?" Amy asked.

"Isn't that how we all feel when Leela starts yakkin'?" Bender said.

"I asked him about the hat he was wearing and when he took it off it was like he had some kind of seizure or something," Leela said anxiously.

"That's what he gets for trying to talk and move at the same time. Think his head would explode if we got him to do three things at once?"

"Gleesh, Bender! Cut it out! We're being worried here!"

"I don't get it. You fleshbags are always springing leaks or getting cancer or falling into dramatic comas. What's the big deal?" The robot punctuated his display of disinterest by emptying the last of his beer into his mouth and belching out a jet of fire.

"It's a simple biological matter," Zoidberg said sagely. "When the male is injured, he secretes a mild neurotoxin that stimulates the anxiety glands in his comrades bodies, thus making him unappetizing long enough to recover without the females chewing up his body to regurgitate for the larvae."

"Good news, everyone!" the Professor announced, to which Leela gasped in horror. "Fry is going to survive."

"Oh," Leela said rather uncertainly. "That _is_ good news. I'm not sure how to react to that."

"Of course it's good news! I _always_ give you good news! Now shut up and listen to my boring exposition!" Farnsworth raised his finglonger and pushed the power button of a nearby projector, conjuring up a three dimensional projection of Fry's brain. "Now, I've examined Fry's brain and made a remarkable discovery. It's _defective_."

The crew exchanged looks. "Ya don't say..." Hermes said.

"Fry appears to possess a unique genetic abnormality that has fundamentally altered the structure of his brain such that he produces no delta brainwave." The Professor adjusted the display to add a brainwave readout highlighting a particular waveform. "This brainwave is produced by every known intelligence in the universe, including robots. Without it you'd all be a bunch of drooling imbeciles. Somehow, Fry is able to function without it. In fact, he copes with its absence better than any of us would, not that that's saying much. However, this anomaly undoubtedly accounts for all his brain problems."

"So the reason he's an idiot is because of a freaky mutation?" Bender asked. "Hey, looks like you two _are_ a match, one-eye!"

"For your information, Bender, shut up," Leela snapped. "So, what's wrong with him?"

"I just told you that you purple haired moron!"

"She _means_ why's he out cold'a than when he was frozen, mon."

"He-whuaa...? Oh, yes, that's because of this hat I made. It's the same model as the one I designed for Gunther all those years ago, only it was never intended for a brain like Fry's. The shock of taking it off overloaded his neurons, causing convulsions, seizure, _excruciating agony_ and finally a light coma state. However, with a few adjustments, I can use the same hat to bring him out of it."

"But, Professor, if taking it off makes him go into a coma, won't he have to wear to forever?" Amy asked.

"Oh my, no. Once I've finished the modifications it will put less stress on his brain. He'll have to wear it for a few days or so to give his brain time to recover but then he'd be able to go back to his usual, dimwitted self."

Leela heaved a sigh of relief while Amy patted her on the back and the Professor busied himself probing around in the hats circuitry with a screwdriver. "There you go, Leela," she said reassuringly, "he'll only be smart enough to notice how cheap and unflattering those pants are for a few days."

"Hey, Fry's been smart before, remember?" Leela protested.

"I rememba bein' hacked ta pieces by a madwoman inside'a Fry's bowels if that's what ya mean."

"Oh don't be such a baby. It was only your robot avatars."

"But the Professor built in pain simulators!" Amy said. "It took _days_ for me to stop having nightmares about it! And why do you even own an ax?"

"Zoidberg's done worse to all of you and you know it."

"Hooray! I'm an excuse!"

"Here we are!" the Professor declared. "Just one last thing and it's ready to try. Amy, fetch out the involuntary adherence module."

"What's that?" Leela asked.

"Oh just a little device I invented a while back. When activated it acts like a thousand rare earth magnets soaked in hyperglue. Once I fit the hat with it Fry will have an easier time removing his own head than he will getting the hat off."

"Here you go, Professor," Amy said, handing over an oddly squishy looking blue-green orb. The Professor jammed the orb into the hat and pressed it to the top of Fry's head.

"Activate the module!" he commanded in the most dramatic voice he could muster. Amy hoisted a massive rifle-shaped device and, with noticeable difficulty, trained it on the tiny hat. She gave a large sliding bolt handle a pull, triggering the rifle to disgorge a spent casing the size of a beer can. Sweat began to bead on the interns brow as she slowly adjusted a dial with her thumb, watching the fold out targeting display through narrowed eyes. Slowly the reticules aligned and the screen blinked green. Amy let out a long, slow breath and squeezed the trigger.

The device hummed and rattled. The massive barrel aperture began to glow a vibrant, electric blue that easily drowned out all the other lights in the room. The Planet Express workers backed slowly away then dove for cover when the rifle began to emit a high-pitched whine and the Professor began to emit diabolical laughter.

Then the noises stopped and a single static bolt jumped from the barrel to the hat.

"There we go!" Amy said cheerfully. She set the rifle down on the counter behind her and glanced around. "Spleesh, what's with you guys?"

Leela, Bender, Hermes and Zoidburg peered out from behind the various pieces of furniture they'd taken refuge behind.

"What happened to the disintegrating?" Zoidburg asked.

"Are you sure that thing wasn't supposed to be a doomsday device?" Leela added cautiously.

"Not really, no." the Professor said.

"Scruffy didn't hide," Amy pointed out.

The mustachioed janitor said nothing, choosing only to level his usual uncomfortable stare at the others while he slowly swirled the water in his bucket with a mop. Fortunately, Fry's unsteady groaning broke the uneasy tension building around the mop water.

"Uhhhrrgghh... why is the world made out of pain?"


	2. Chapter 2

**I'd like to say a thank you to my two reviewers for taking the time to sling some feedback my way. I honestly didn't think I'd get even one review so thanks a lot. Also, thank you to the individual who gave this story a favorite (you know who you are), really didn't see that coming.**

**This chapter ends a bit abruptly but the next parts I want to do feel like they should be on their own.**

**As before, I welcome any and all feedback, positive and negative alike. Thanks for reading and I hope you derive some entertainment from it.**

* * *

Fry tentatively prodded the tiny hat that now sat on his head with unnatural rigidity. The delivery boy wasn't sure how to react to everything the Professor had told him about his new situation and he was even less sure how to react to the fact that he thought he actually understood the gist of it on his first try.

"So... how much smarter is this thing making me?" he asked at last.

"Hmm... that's difficult to say," the Professor admitted. "Your unique brain structure is a complete unknown. That you ever managed to come close to mastering shoelaces without a delta brainwave is truly remarkable."

Fry shrugged. "It did take a long time but I think that may be partially my hands fault. Got a lot easier while I had the robot hands."

"Man, it's so... _freaky_," Amy said. "Watching Fry be all coherent and make reasonable observations and stuff."

Fry's face sank into a slight frown. He knew that he probably the dumbest person he'd ever met but he didn't exactly enjoy having it rubbed in his face all the time. Besides, hadn't the Professor just said that it was a genetic thing? Memories of the blatant anti-mutant prejudice that had once seen Leela banished from the surface by people who saw them as 'genetically inferior' swirled uncomfortably in the front of his mind until Hermes' voice broke his train of thought.

"I'm just glad we don't have ta go rootin' around in your bowels like last time," Hermes said.

"Are you feeling alright, Fry?" Leela asked. Fry's frown was quickly replaced with a smile at his girlfriends concern.

"I feel a little weird but I think I'm okay." He hopped down from the table and straightened up experimentally. The room seemed to slosh a little with the movement like a loose stepping stone across pond but otherwise his brain managed to cope.

"Welp! Glad that boring crap is over with," Bender said. "Fry survived yet another near-death experience and we're all richer for it... Let's go get hammered!"

"Hammered?" the Professor said, visibly alarmed. "Absolutely not! Under no circumstances may Fry ingest any alcohol whatsoever!"

"What? Why not?" Fry asked.

"Yeah, you're talking crazier than usual," Bender added.

"Guh!" Amy cut in. "Your brain almost got fried, remember? Who knows what a bunch of beer would do to you. You're going to have to be careful."

Fry blinked as Amy's words sunk in. "Oh. I guess that makes sense."

"Now, don't be stupid, Fry," Leela began. "You need to- wait, what?"

"I said it makes sense. I don't want to end up brain damaged, after all."

The Planet Express team exchanged looks ranging from amazed to unsettled.

"I think he's a clone," Zoidberg said in a whisper that was several notches too loud to go unnoticed.

"_Flreaky_," Amy agreed.

Leela put her hands on her hips and fixed the others with a glare. "Don't you all have jobs to be bad at?"

"You people work here?" the Professor said, amazed by this newest revelation. "What do you think you're doing, slacking off? Get back to work!" A few quick jabs with a cattle prod into Hermes' and Zoidberg's midsections was enough to encourage the crew to make a hasty retreat from the laboratory.

–

He wasn't sure if it was the hat or Slurm withdrawal but Fry was restless. Normally on days without deliveries he wound up spending most of his time on the lounge couch watching television. He had always been the kind of person who could lose entire days to TV to the point that someone had to threaten to pry him out of his groove with a crowbar at least every other week.

Today it wasn't working. Reruns of Calculon's acting in _All my Circuits_ seemed even hammier than usual. _The Scary Door_ must have been thrown together in a single drug hazed afternoon by someone with a big deadline looming and if he heard Elzar say "bam!" one more time he was going to go insane.

Fry clicked the TV off and gradually worked his way into a standing position. Once he was on his feet however he realized he had no idea what to do with himself. He'd have no understanding of what the Professor and Amy were doing even with the hat and Hermes' work was almost lethally boring. Zoidberg would either be digging through garbage or inadvertently maiming a patient and Benders activities were best left a mystery. There was also Nibbler but Fry found that being alone with the tiny alien gave him the oddest feeling of impending doom for some reason he couldn't place.

That just left Leela. For once in her life Leela had actually encouraged Fry to relax in front of the TV under the premise that he wasn't likely to find anything that would tax his brain amongst the daytime lineup. On the one hand, she might be annoyed that he wasn't still doing it. On the other hand, maybe she'd be grateful if he tried to help with cleaning the ship? He'd seen people clean before, after all. He'd even done it a few times without somehow leaving things filthier than when he'd arrived. At the very least Leela might have a suggestion of something else to do that didn't involve soap operas.

When he climbed the stairs into the ships hold the first thing he noticed was the stench of industrial grade cleaning agents. The next thing he noticed was that the stench was around for good reason. The hold that had been a blood splattered mess that morning was practically clean enough to eat off of any given surface. Leela was tossing a final bag of debris off the edge of the cargo hatch into the waiting pile below the ship when Fry approached her.

"Man, you really got this place done," Fry said.

"Fry? I thought I told you to go watch TV. Did you do something?" she asked immediately.

"Uh... no."

"Did Bender destroy something?"

"Not that he's bragged to me about."

"Did we lose our cable connection?"

"Nah."

"Alright, I give up. What is it?"

Fry shrugged. "There was nothing good on. Thought I'd see how you were doing and stuff."

Leela appeared to be genuinely puzzled by this answer for a few moments. Then her eye flicked up to the hat perched on Fry's head and understanding set in. "I'm done, actually."

"That was fast. I figured you'd be at it for a few more hours."

"So did I, but it turns out that I got help. Did you know we have a janitor?" She jerked a thumb over her shoulder at Scruffy. The janitor simply licked his finger and turned the page of the magazine he was reading.

"Now that you mention it... I think I _do_ remember that guy. Hasn't he been here for years?" Fry frowned when Leela's eye darted between his face and the hat again.

"Uh... Leela? Am I doing something weird?"

"No. No, of course not."

"It's just you keep looking at the hat."

"Wait, you noti- euh, I mean... It's not the hat. It's... uh..."

Fry's eyes narrowed. "You think I'm acting weird too. Just like everyone else."

"...Well, you are acting a little different, Fry. I mean, you _like_ watching TV. Wouldn't you be surprised if I stopped enjoying martial arts?"

Fry stopped to consider that. Leela's love of beating the tar out of things was as central to her personality as her love of small furry creatures or her bossiness. Was sitting in front of a TV really that defining for him?

"I guess I am acting a _little_ different," Fry admitted. "And I _would_ be kind of confused if you stopped wanting to beat people up all the time." Fortunately Fry missed Leela glancing at the hat again before she replied.

"A whole lot of people would have to stop being idiots before that could happen," Leela agreed. "Of course it figures that the one time you want something to do there's not much left _to_ do."

Fry sighed and started back down the stairs. "Man, today is dull. First I'm comatose, then I'm _bored_."

"Look on the bright side, Fry," Leela said, following him down the stairs. "At least the day is almost over."

"Yeah, I guess. Oh, hey, are we still on for tonight?"

Leela crossed her arms and gave Fry an appraising look. "You might be better off going home to get some rest."

"Aw, come on, Leela. Bender's had hooker bots over every night this week."

"Too loud to sleep through?"

"He won't _let_ me sleep through it. Bender isn't happy unless everyone on the floor knows _exactly_ what's going on."

"That does sound like Bender," Leela admitted. "Alright, you can sleep at my place."

"Yes!"

"I mean _sleep, _Fry. You're taking it easy until I'm sure you're better."

"Geez, Leela, what gives? I mean, I know you're always trying to stop me from getting myself killed and stuff but this is overkill nagging even for you."

Fry expected Leela to jab her finger in his face and give her usual retorts about how she was right and he knew it, or how he needed to be less reckless and listen to her. Instead her eye avoided his, her posture slumped ever so slightly and she half turned away from him.

"It is not," she said somewhat lamely. "I just don't think brain injuries are anything to mess with. It's not like buying a new pair of hands or a spleen."

"Okay, I'll take it easy," Fry promised. "It's not like you ever aren't worth the wait."

Leela finally gave him a small smile. "Well, I suppose if you're not going to watch TV, you can at least help me get this garbage to the dumpster for recycling pickup."


	3. Chapter 3

**Let me start with a thank you to all my reviewers thus far. I appreciate the feedback. Even if I'm never sure how to reply to any of it directly I assure you I read it and take it seriously. I'd also like to thank the couple of you who have favorited and/or followed. Didn't expect that to happen at all ever.**

**That all being said, lets get back to it. Trying a different perspective on this one. No idea how it turned out. I'll take any feedback, positive and negative alike.**

* * *

The previous night had been good. It had just been the two of them in Leela's spartan apartment sharing a pizza and watching a movie. They'd settled on some comedy flick with an utterly forgettable plot that none the less had provoked some laughter from them. Fry had laughed at a few jokes he probably wouldn't have gotten normally and he'd seemed to have some trouble falling asleep afterward but the evening was otherwise uneventful. All things considered it was better than Leela could have expected.

Leela was further relieved when she woke up the next morning to not only a distinct lack of any troubling memories related to the night before but also no signs of a difficult day ahead right out of the gate. Fry was exactly where she'd left him, namely laying down behind her with an arm clumsily draped over her waist. It was an increasingly familiar experience and one Leela was slowly allowing herself to admit to enjoying. It was hard for her to fight old habits. Sometimes she wondered if she'd ever really be able to let go of all her Fry based hangups. She had so _many_ of them, after all.

As was her normal morning routine she filed such concerns back into the latent mental illness pile and hauled herself out of bed. She hesitated at the door, turning her eye back to Fry. A small smile graced her lips at the sight of him still fast asleep. Just like any normal day it was going to take a lot more than a quiet alarm and her getting out of bed to get him awake. That left her enough time for her morning exercises, a shower, waking Fry, browbeating Fry into a shower (which on reflection she might have to skip until she asked the Professor if that hat was waterproof), and convincing Fry that this didn't get him out of future showers either way. With a bit of luck they'd be able to hack their way through any lingering gigantic bean vines fast enough to have time for breakfast at Planet Express before work started.

–

The morning had continued to play out exactly along expected lines. Fry had been his usual groggy self that waking up on time always made him to the point that Leela had to practically dump him out of bed to get his butt in gear. There weren't any vines blocking the tube network and the new machetes Leela had ordered got them through those that had gotten in their way on foot. They'd arrived on time and Fry had helped himself to a bowl of Archduke Chocula while Leela opened a can of Kibbles 'n Snouts for Nibbler before settling down at the table to eat her own cereal. It was all perfectly ordinary.

But still Leela was tense.

It had set in the moment it had been time to wake Fry up. It felt like the first time they'd made a delivery to the robot planet. She and Fry had been forced to don crummy disguises and attempt to blend in with the human hating populace. She'd been surrounded, all but alone, with no choice but to press on and hope to slip by unnoticed long enough to do what she needed to do and go home. At any moment the crowds could have turned hostile and descended upon her like ravenous wolves all because she wasn't like them. It had been like high school all over again.

The motivations were different but that same feeling had settled over her now. A gnawing, oppressive anxiety that spiked every time Fry opened his mouth but otherwise simply hung around her neck like heavy scrap metal fashioned into a necklace and painstakingly disguised as a proper piece of cheap jewelry. But that necklace had been easy enough to throw away after prom night. Fry's hat was out of her hands.

The worst part was that he was now perceptive enough to tell something was wrong before it came to a head.

"Are you still worried about me?"

"What? What makes you think that?"

"I... don't know," Fry said slowly. "It's like you're about to punch people but you're not actually punching people yet." Fry furrowed his brow in concentration. "Or maybe it's like when..."

Leela waited several second for Fry to continue. When he continued to stare at her in silence she spoke up. "Like when what?"

"Huh? I don't know. You just seem worried is all."

"It's nothing really. It's just..." Leela cast about for a reasonable excuse. It'd been so long since she'd had to come up with something plausible to throw Fry off that she wasn't sure what would actually work on him. She'd have to tell something like the truth.

"I'm just worried about the hat. I mean, we get into trouble on deliveries a lot. What if it gets damaged and you go back into a coma while we're running for our lives?"

Nibbler paused in his ravenous assault on his breakfast to chime in with his eternally dramatic baritone. "A valid concern. Perhaps it would be wiser for Fry to remain on Earth."

"I hadn't thought of that," Fry admitted. "I could wear a helmet? Or... do we have one that would fit over the hat? Wait, what are we talking about? It took 10 years for us to make 100 deliveries. What are the odds we'll go anywhere today?"

"Good news, everyone!"

–

Leela had a bad feeling about this delivery. Granted, when you worked at Planet Express that sort of feeling carried about as much weight as expecting rain on a tropical storm planet. This delivery had specific reasons for feeling particularly ominous, however. The crew was one man short since the Professor had lost all sense of time and driven her and Fry from the building before anyone else had shown up. Consequently, Leela had to remain behind to watch the ship while Fry ventured out into the brown and green muck outside with the hover dolly to deliver the package.

Sending Fry out alone was typically an invitation to disaster but there hadn't been any way around it. The planets unstable terrain meant someone had to be at the controls to lift the ship off if the landing pad decided to plunge into the murky depths. And so, Leela sat there.

And sat there.

And sat there while drumming her fingers.

And sat there while not drumming her fingers.

After what felt like an eternity she heard the cargo elevator rising back into the belly of the ship. She sprang to her feet and charged through the door and down the stairs to the hold. Fry was there, no worse for wear, though his shoes and pants were thoroughly caked with mud. The dolly was in one piece as well and loaded with two bags, one nearly the size of a piano, the other closer to a basketball.

"Fry? Did anything go wrong? Why did you bring stuff back?"

"They didn't pay in advance," Fry answered, jerking his thumb at the larger sack. "That's the money."

"Huh. Hermes must not have been in on this one. Normally he never lets us see how much money we're not ever going to get a reasonable cut of. What's the other bag?"

"Oh, this?" Fry picked up the smaller bag and they both started up the stairs to the bridge. "Tip."

"You got a _tip?_" Leela said incredulously.

"I know! They said I earned a little extra for being 'punctual and professional'. Also for not running away screaming when they turned out to be 20 foot tall worms filled with teeth. I think they get a lot of that."

"Wait, you _didn't_ run away screaming?"

"Nah, I looked up the planet on the computer during the flight over. Told me all about them."

"Oh."

"Wait, aren't you supposed to be at the controls in case the ship sinks?" As soon as the words left the delivery boys mouth the deck tilted underfoot. Leela stumbled through the open doorway, tripped over the door jam and landed in the navigators chair in an undignified heap. Fry skidded past her and caught hold of the main console with little more than his fingertips. With considerable effort he hauled himself into the chair, turned the key and yanked the stick into gear.

Bessie rose from the sinking cement slab with a graceless lurch. The ship listed and swayed for a few sickening moments before finally settling into a steady hover once Fry got his bearings enough to take control.

"Whew, that was close, huh, Leela?" Fry shot a nervous post-near-death-escape smile at his captain. Leela gaped at him in silence. "I guess I'll, uh... get us into orbit? Then give you the wheel back? Kind of seems like a bad idea to let go while we're hovering here. So... hold on?"

Leela nodded mutely and swiveled her chair around to face front but her eye remained fixed on Fry. He'd learned how to pilot the ship years ago in a bid to impress her but he'd rarely taken the helm for anything but deep space cruising when Leela deemed it safe to allow him to live out his old fashioned space travel dreams for a while. For him to take charge like that not just during some personal quest he'd gotten stuck in his head but on the bridge of the ship, _her_ ship, was something Leela didn't have words for.

He'd pulled the delivery off. The clients had been so pleased that they'd given him a tip bigger than his head and he'd returned completely unscathed. He'd managed this because he'd had the forethought to research their destination, something Leela had given up on after years of briefings being a waste of time. When the mission had threatened to fail it had been because _she_ had failed in _her_ job and it had been _Fry_ who saved the day.

Now he was sitting in her chair, competently piloting them up and out of the atmosphere. He was doing it quietly, without any excited babbling or sound effects or anything. Fry was focusing on doing his job. She could see it his face and posture, even in profile. The way he leaned forward, drew his eyebrows down and tightened his lips ever so slightly like he had to force his senses to stay attentive to the situation at hand.

Leela tore her eye away and stared determinedly at the stars appearing outside the windows. She knew that look all too well. She'd seen it so many times before on certain bald man with short, yet unkempt, facial hair.

"Leela?" Fry asked hesitantly. "We're in space now. Do you want to take the wheel?"

"Yeah." Leela screwed her eye shut, took a long, steadying breath and forced her offending thoughts back into the dark corners where they belonged. When she opened her eye again it was framed by her usual no-nonsense captains face. "I'll take over. Go make sure the money hasn't been spilled all over the hanger. If we lose any we'll end up having to sleep through another of Hermes' four hour lectures. I'll call you up when we reach a drive-thru."

–

"This is no big deal. You're not going to start freaking out," Leela assured herself. "Okay, so he pulled off a delivery without a hitch. And he kind of saved both our necks. I mean, he's done that before, right? And it's not his fault he reminded you of Lars. That's just the hat shaking things up. He only has so many facial expressions he can make so one of them was bound to be similar. But he's _not_ Lars, he's still Fry. I think. Oh lord."

Leela sank back in her chair and glared at the stars as if to blame them for her problems. Everything with Fry had to get so complicated. Or did it? After all, Fry only needed to wear the hat for a little while, just enough to get his brain back on its feet. It _was_ just that damned little device that was over complicating things. Once it was off, Fry would be right back to his old self. This was just a temporary bump in the road. Like a coma, or having to hide from all technology on the Amish planet, or having your entire body turn into tentacles.

After all, Fry was nothing if not consistent in some matters. It wasn't as though being as smart as everyone else for a while would make him _act_ like everyone else. It'd just be a few disturbing shades of parasitic worms and time travel. It's not as though Fry would actually change his mind about-

The sound of the door opening jerked Leela out of her thoughts.

"Haven't we passed a Fishy Joe's or something by now? I'm starving."

"What are you doing up here, Fry? Is the payment secure?"

"Yeah, it's all still in the bag. Probably a good thing Bender didn't come along. Anyway, we stopping for food?"

"No, we can eat when we get back. We passed a few places but we're right in the middle of the lunch rush. The shortest line was half an AU long."

"Fine, I'll go dig through the fridge then."

"Hermes said not to open that until the request forms he sent in for a hazmat team goes through."

Fry gagged involuntarily. "Oh God, has Bender been cooking again?" The mere thought of the robots abominable cooking inspired dry heaves in all who had experienced it.

"God, I hope not," Leela shuddered. "I still remember what he did to that slug."

"Don't remind me."

Fry settled into his usual chair and propped his feet up on the console. After a few minutes of silence stretched out between them Leela noticed the sound of quiet humming. Fry had his hands behind his head, his eyes pointed out the window and one foot tapping air in time with a familiar tune.

Leela felt the tension in her shoulders slowly bleeding away into the chair as she took in the scene. With a quiet sigh she shifted into a more comfortable position and returned her attention to the star spangled vista ahead. It was so typically Fry to stare out the window not to spot problems, but just to look. To Leela space had always seemed so utterly featureless and boring. A vast span of void with only a few nebulae to brighten up the dismal blackness. But if there was one thing she'd learned from Fry it was to stop taking sights like this for granted. The universe really was incredible when you stopped to look at it. Even someplace as barren as the moon.

Leela gently nudged the ship into a minor course correction and as Fry began the next chorus she found herself following along in the barest whisper.

"_I'm walking on sunshine... ohh-Oohhh..."_


	4. Chapter 4

**As usual, I'd like to thank those of you who reviewed my last chapter. This one came together quicker and feels a bit disjointed to me, but I've run out of ideas of what to do with it. Also an experiment in switching perspectives, which I normally only do between chapters. I figure fan fiction is as good a place as any to try different things.**

**Anyway, thanks for reading and I welcome any feedback anyone has.**

* * *

Leela didn't know if she should be relieved or angry that everyone else was just as stunned by the results of the latest delivery as she had been. She may not have had the best history of reading Fry's emotions but she could tell when something was really bothering him. Now was one of those times.

He'd been excited when they'd touched down in the hanger, eager to tell everyone how he'd delivered the package without any screw ups and even gotten a tip. Leela had been dreading the part where he would recount their departure from the swampy mudball but he'd actually opted to gloss over that part. The rest of the crew had been impressed.

The problem was that they were _too_ impressed.

Shocked and amazed was a more apt descriptor for most of them, super-charged with greed for Bender. The kleptomaniacal machine had almost extended his eyes right out of his head at the sight of such a huge amount of money.

While everyone was aware that Fry's intelligence had received a boost nobody had really adjusted to it yet. They were used to Fry being amazed and impressed by the most mundane things in modern life and by his own rather meager accomplishments. The upshot of this was that the praise for a job well done was distributed in the stilted and condescending manner that was normally reserved for praising a small child's terrible finger painting. For perhaps the first time since she'd met Fry she realized just how horrible it really sounded.

If the sullen way Fry was staring at his half eaten sandwich was any indication he felt the same way.

Leela settled down onto the couch next to Fry, casting him a sidelong look when he failed to react. She'd barely opened her mouth when Fry cut her off.

"I'm fine."

"You don't look fine," Leela said.

"Yeah, well, it's probably just Slurm withdrawal." Fry took a petulant bite of his sandwich, still avoiding Leela's eye.

"Oh, let me go get you one then." Fry was always in a better mood after a cold Slurm. It had proven to be a useful shortcut to ending minor sulking sessions in the past.

"Nuh, am trahn tuh giff id uhb," Fry said through a mouthful of processed meat and bread.

"What?"

Fry swallowed and wiped his mouth on his jacket sleeve. "I said I'm trying to give it up."

"Give it up?" Leela echoed, disbelieving.

"I can't stop remembering where it comes from."

"You mean the Slurm Queen's-"

"_Eating,"_ Fry protested.

"Sorry."

Leela watched Fry finish off his lunch in silence. He was obviously not in the best of moods and she was at a loss for ideas to cheer him up. It wasn't like him to get and stay so down over something like people treating him like an idiot.

"You feel like going out tonight?" she asked at last.

"Out where?"

"I don't know. Anywhere. I mean, you can't drink right now but we should be able to find something to do. Just the two of us."

Fry's expression brightened somewhat. "We could burn through some of this tip money, I guess."

"You should hold onto that. You might need it for something."

"Like what? I can't think of anything else I'd rather spend money on than you."

"Aww... that's so sweet of you, Fry. Short sighted and financially irresponsible but sweet."

Fry rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly. "Yeah, well, it's true. I mean, I know I screw it up a lot but spending time with you is always the best part of my day."

"I wouldn't go _that_ far," Leela said uncomfortably. "I do kind of boss you around a lot at work."

"So?"

"You mutinied over it once."

Fry shrugged. "Yeah, but that was before Zapp was in charge. You're strict and all, but you keep us alive. Mostly. I mean, sure, most of us have died at _least_ once at this point but you don't _try_ to get us killed. Except the space whale thing but I think that was the weird obsession feeding thing it was doing. Look, the important thing is that you've saved me more times than I can usually count so being bossy is a good thing."

"Thank you, Fry. That's nice of you to say. I think."

"Sorry. I guess I suck at some stuff even when I'm smart."

"Don't worry about it."

–

Fry wasn't sure what it was, but Leela had been determined to get him out the door the moment the workday had ended. Typically it was Fry who was the more eager of the pair with Leela being the one reigning him in or telling him why they shouldn't do things. A strange, cynical thought had been that she trusted him more with the hat on. He much preferred the alternative explanation that she was simply trying to make him feel better.

He was also starting to deeply hate the hat.

Far from being easier to understand, the world was much more complicated when intelligent. Here he was on a totally unplanned, unscripted, do-whatever-we-want-to date with the woman he had been in love with for so long and he was barely enjoying himself. Leela also seemed just a little too tense about the whole thing but he couldn't work out why. So far all being smart had done for his relationship with Leela was put a unnamed nagging feeling in the back of his head and make her uncomfortable. Or was that what the feeling was about?

Their destination had turned out to be a museum of space travel since the end of the 20th century, complete with records of all the alien races they'd made contact with. He found ways to drag out admiring the awesome ships, replicas of awesome ships and blackened, twisted remains of awesome ships for Leela's sake. He'd noticed her hanging back a bit at times, working the controls of her wrist device in an increasingly frustrated search for something else to do when they were done. He'd have suggested they just go kill a few hours at the virtual arcade in the latest installment of "Factory of Death", but he couldn't really see the VR helmet fitting right now. Instead he made an offhand comment about being hungry and watched Leela triumphantly dig up a list of nearby restaurants.

Leela had been relieved when Fry declared himself ready for dinner. This date had been a disorganized mess right from the get go. So far as she could tell Fry didn't seem to mind that and indeed had been fascinated by seeing all the greatest space ships of Earthican history. Still, something was troubling him, leaving her casting about for something else for them to do. This had proven to be a much greater challenge than she'd expected until Fry gave her that easy out. Now things were simple. They'd have dinner someplace ordinary and talk about whatever random topics they could think of. After that they could take a nice, relaxing walk in the park before returning to her apartment for the night.

Ordinarily she'd debate with herself a lot more before deciding to take Fry home with her but she just couldn't bring herself to send him back to Bender's closet. With the way everyone was acting around him she wanted Fry to know that she at least was still there and that she valued whatever it was that was going on between them. She did not for the life of her know what said thing was but she was certain that she wasn't going to lose it to a hat.

"How do you feel about some buggalo burgers? There's a place just down the street from here with good reviews that we shouldn't be under dressed for."

"Sounds good to me."

Leela felt a twinge of disappointment when Fry put his hands in his pockets but she made no comment. It didn't really mean anything, after all. Holding hands or not holding hands was about as irrelevant a detail as could be imagined in the grand scheme of things. His hand was usually sticky anyway. She squared her shoulders and focused her attention of not running into other pedestrians.

It wasn't long until they found the restaurant and a open booth. Leela had barely started studying the menu when she heard a familiar voice filter over the background noise of the other diners.

"Come on, Kiffy. It won't be so bad."

"Oooh, I don't know, Amy... I mean, you were engaged to him for a while..."

"Spluh. But that's ancient history. He lost interest the moment I said 'monogamous'."

"Is that Amy?" Fry asked.

Leela shrugged. "I guess she and Kif are on a date. Figures they'd pick the same place."

"Took you two long enough," another familiar voice said.

"Wait, Bender too?" Leela said. A sinking feeling was starting up in her stomach and only got worse when more joined in the overheard conversation.

"Ah, my good friends Amy and the boyfriend," Zoidberg exclaimed. "You'll help pay the bill, perhaps? Let the good doctor have a hot meal? I can offer a free checkup in the morning?"

"Euhh... let's just say it's on me, no checkup required."

"Hooray!"

"Ah, shut up ya filt'y, moochin' crab," Hermes' voice joined in.

"Jeez, guess we weren't invited," Fry said grouchily.

"Oh, they probably figured we'd be going out tonight, Fry. I wouldn't jump to conclusions."

"Yeah... you're probably right. Oh well, I have all the company I need right here." Leela smiled and was about to say something when their coworkers conversation caught her attention again.

"Man, I can't _believe_ how proud Fry was about that tip," Amy said.

Leela went rigid in her seat. This was the last thing this night needed. She'd had a plan, damn it. If Fry overheard them talking about him... Thankfully, he must have decided that their conversation wasn't interesting and was focused intently on his menu. Thanking heaven for small favors Leela tried to do the same. Her ears had other plans.

"Means plenty of lootin' for me. I ought to be able to find something I can't just as easily steal to buy with that sack of cash."

"Spleesh, Bender, do you ever stop stealing from him? Besides, Leela will have gotten him to put it all in the bank."

Bender made an affronted sound at Amy's prediction. "Stupid girlfriend getting all interfering. How much longer do you think until she dumps him again?"

"I don't know... she seems pretty attached this time. Maybe a month?"

"Actually, I was thinking they might stay together," Kif said. "After all, they do seem to be happier when they are."

"You kiddin', mon? With all the stupid things Fry does I give it two weeks at most. Rememba when he told everyone Leela was a mutant? I _still_ can't believe she forgave him for that."

Leela scowled at her menu. What business of it was theirs how she conducted her personal life? Fry hadn't meant to get her banished from the surface. For all the reputation the Stupid Ages had for intolerance Fry had never seemed to grasp the severity of mutant segregation. Given his brain problem and everything he'd done afterward to help the mutants, going so far as to try to become one himself, Leela couldn't manage to hold a grudge.

Leela looked up to check on Fry. He was still staring at his menu. In fact, he was starting at exactly the same place he had been several minutes ago. Leela's heart sank when she realized that he had been listening the whole time.

"And then there was that time when Fry got his head stuck in that crater," Bender said.

"They're talking about me like I'm a stupid puppy or something," Fry grumbled.

"Oh, come on, Fry," Leela said gently, "Sure, you made a lot of mistakes, but we always got through it together, didn't we? And besides, the Professor said it's a genetic thing so none of it was really your fault."

"I can't get over how childish he used to be," Amy was saying. "He was all 'space travel is the gloolest thing' and 'the moon is going to be _awesome!_' like every little thing was just _mindblowing!_"

Fry sank a little lower in his seat. "The moon _was_ awesome..."

"Come on, Fry, let's get out of here," Leela said. She took hold of Fry's hand and stood, trying to pull him up to follow her. Fry's mind was still fixated on his co-workers conversation to the point that he barely responded to being hauled upright.

"I'll be glad when he gets that hat off," Bender said. For a moment Fry's spirits visibly lifted. They crashed back down harder than Bessie when Bender finished his thought. "He actually caught me going for his wallet today! Sooner he gets it off the sooner I get back to robbing the chump blind."

Fry wrested his hand from Leela's grasp.

Fry's fists were clenched in sudden rage, his eyes fixed each of his so-called friends in turn with a furious death glare. Amy choked on her drink when she caught sight of the enraged delivery boy storming towards their table.

"Guh oh."

Amy, Hermes and Zoidberg all looked at Fry with various degrees of apprehension. Kif's camouflage reflex had engaged, leaving a headless velour uniform and a floating pair of eyes seated next to Amy. It turned out that the Professor was there as well although he was snoring quietly in the corner of the booth, completely oblivious to the unfolding situation. Bender took a long pull on his cigar and blew the smoke in Fry's general direction.

"What's your problem, meatbag?"

Slowly the rage started to bleed away. The anger that had moments ago been demanding that he start throwing punches was replaced by a dull emptiness in the face of his best friends total lack of concern until he felt as though he'd been hollowed out where he stood.

"Is this really how you guys see me?" Fry asked quietly. "Like some dumb pet you laugh at for getting choked by his leash? The guy you take advantage of because he's too dumb to notice or hold a grudge? The stupid kid who doesn't know any better than to be amazed by new things?"

"I wouldn't put it like-," Amy began hesitantly.

"Yup!" Bender cut in.

"Bender!"

"What? It's true!" the robot protested. "The only smart thing he ever did was make friends with me, Bender."

"You kiddin'? That was one of the _dumbest_ things he eva' did!" Hermes said. The accountant winced when Fry's shoulders sagged a bit further. The wince became a somewhat frightened cringe when he noticed the disgusted expression (and cracking knuckles) of the cyclops standing behind Fry. "Ooh..."

"Forget it," Fry said in a dead monotone. "In a couple days I'll be too stupid to understand any of this, remember? So you may as well go ahead and laugh at me. Seems like it's all I'm good for. Phillip J. Fry the hilariously stupid nobody," he added quietly. Without a further word Fry turned away from the table.

"You got it, pal!" Bender called after him. His raucous cackles chased Fry all the way to the exit.


	5. Chapter 5

**As usual I'd like to thank everyone who reviewed the previous chapter and the additional follower it seems to have garnered. Hopefully this one won't change any minds. ****Had some trouble with it. I keep wanting to jump ahead of myself.**

**In any event, thanks for reading and I welcome any and all feedback you might have.**

* * *

Leela had never seen Fry upset quite like this before. She'd seen him cry on several occasions and in a way she'd almost prefer that he was crying now. Fry crying was something she'd experienced, something she had an idea of how to react to. She didn't have a clue how to react to... _this_.

Fry wasn't crying, he wasn't yelling, he wasn't complaining or mumbling or saying anything at all. He was completely silent, staring at the sidewalk just ahead of his feet and letting her steer him along the path to her apartment. If she'd been reluctant to send him home before there was no way in hell, robot or otherwise, that she was going to leave him there now. He was staying right where she could keep her eye on him and as far away from those _jerks_ as possible.

If she hadn't been so unwilling to let Fry leave the restaurant alone she'd have been more than happy to beat the crap out of them all, especially Bender. He could see how much he loved his shiny metal ass after she'd lodged it in his head. None of them had even tried to apologize.

And they wouldn't, either. They wouldn't because they'd know they were right, at least about some of it. Fry _was_ an idiot. There was no denying the simple truth of that statement no matter how cruel it seemed. That fact had in no small part fueled her years of spurning his advances despite how persistent or heartfelt he could be. Even after admitting her own feelings for him it had been easier to backtrack than to face coping with his shortcomings once the specter of doom was lifted. Plus the whole robot duplicates thing had been confusing. It had only been comparatively recently that she'd started to think that maybe, just maybe, heartfelt was more important than thought out.

She wished he'd say something stupid. Or anything at all for that matter. Instead of his usual aimless small talk he stayed silent all the way there, right up the stairs and to the door to apartment 1-I. He'd been abnormally smart the first time she had brought him here too. At the time she'd been swooning hard for what the parasites had made him, ready to drag him straight to her bedroom at the slightest provocation. It was embarrassing in hindsight, even if he had been amazing and she had been desperately lonely. How did Fry feel about that whole mess? Was he thinking about it right now? Remembering how she'd rejected him the moment he'd reverted to normal?

What was she supposed to do?

Leela guided the still quiescent Fry over to the couch she'd brought in when it became clear that she was going to need more than a single chair in her living room if Fry was going to keep visiting her. They sat there for several minutes before Fry spoke at last.

"Sorry about our date."

"It's not your fault they're a bunch of jerks," Leela said gently.

"They were right though," Fry said. "I'm a _moron_."

Leela opened her mouth to protest but he words died on her tongue. How could she deny it without a lie? Alright, that angle was out. But they were still jerks. You could be right and still be a jackass about it.

"That's no excuse."

"For what, being honest?"

"It wasn't honest! It was insulting!"

"Like there's a nice way to say 'you're the dumbest person who ever lived'? I doubt it."

"I used to think there was no nice way to say that I have one eye," Leela countered. "But you found a way."

Fry snorted dismissively. "Nice try, Leela, but there was never anything wrong with your eye. There _is_ something wrong with my brain. And don't try the depth perception thing. That's something you've obviously learned to manage. I wreck things by being stupid all the time."

Leela refused to let herself get sidetracked by the warm feelings Fry's stubborn refusal to admit that her eye was weird evoked. "Don't be so hard on yourself. Alright, so you're not as smart as everyone else. It's not like it's your fault," she said. Nibbler made a funny little sound from the other room but Leela ignored him. "I mean, come on, it's not like you're Zapp Brannigan."

"That's true," Fry conceded, albeit somewhat grudgingly. Still, it was progress. Leela doubted he'd really get all the way back to cheerful tonight no matter what she said.

"Why don't we order some takeout or something?" she said. "I've also got some ice cream in the freezer."

"Sure. I'll pay," Fry added with a wan smile. Leela bit back her objections to that plan and started dialing in the local Chinese takeout number. If spending his tip money on her made him feel better then she'd let him. All she wanted was for things to go back to normal as quickly as possible. Tomorrow she'd ask the Professor how much longer until that accursed hat could be taken off. Once it was everything would be alright again.

–

After an hour or so of careful study Fry had determined that Leela had the most featureless ceiling in the universe. He hadn't had time to examine it so closely in the past but sleep wasn't coming to him as readily as it usually did. It wasn't even for the fun reasons he often had when spending the night with Leela. She'd insisted again that he needed rest as though she was still carrying some notion that his brain was ready to break at the slightest provocation. He couldn't shake the feeling that something else was going on there but he hadn't been in the mood anyway so he'd let it go.

He shifted his head around on his pillow to get a better look at his bunkmate. She had long since fallen asleep next to him, pinning his arm to the mattress and reaching one of her own across his chest. Given his habit of falling asleep first he'd rarely had the opportunity to see her like this. It was different than when she'd been in that two week coma. Then she'd looked wrong somehow. Unhealthy. Now she was relaxed and calm. It was nice to see. Sometimes it felt like he was always making her mad.

That was the real problem wasn't it? He was a constant screw up. They'd spent month after month in a on/off relationship that switched positions so fast he never knew where they stood. Every time they'd started to get close he'd be sent right back to arms length. The only explanation was that he'd done something wrong, even when he couldn't figure out what it was. Leela had always just been waiting for the next moronic thing to happen and she'd never been disappointed. How long until he finally did something so horrendously stupid that it ended things forever? Or until he got her killed in some way that the Professor couldn't fix?

But he hadn't made her mad these last couple of days. He hadn't almost gotten them killed on a delivery. He hadn't even said anything so incredibly stupid that everyone had to stop and stare at him with that expression they got when that happened. Alright, so they'd stopped and stared in shock and confusion when he said smart things instead but hey, it was a change of pace.

Fry hated the hat for complicating his relationship with Leela.

He hated the hat for letting him understand at last just how pointless and stupid his life was.

Most of all, he hated the hat for making him start to believe that maybe taking it off wasn't such a good idea after all.

–

Leela was trying to wake Fry and he really didn't appreciate it. Sleep was comfortable. Sleep was safe. Sleep was not having to go to work and deal with everyone again.

"Come _on_, Fry. We can't do this all morning." That was the best news Fry had heard in days. Maybe it meant she'd give up and let him postpone the inevitable. He heard a heavy sigh and the sound of booted feet walking and relaxed in triumph. Then the bed tilted sharply to one side, dumping him unceremoniously to the floor.

"Guah! Leela! What gives!?" he demanded once he disentangled his head from the sheets enough to speak without gagging himself with them.

"I know you're still upset about last night, Fry, but you can't just hide from it in bed."

"Not _anymore_," Fry grumbled.

"Not ever," Leela corrected him. "Now, do you want to stay here and sulk or go to work and beat up Bender?"

"I want to forget it ever happened."

"What?"

"I said I want to forget about it," Fry repeated. "Beating up Bender won't make me any less of a moron."

"It's not like he doesn't have it coming," Leela retorted. "I don't get why you hang out with him anyway. I mean, you only knew him for at most a couple of hours before I tracked you down."

"I met him in a Suicide Booth."

"A Suicide Booth? I know you were miserable when I finally caught up to you in Old New York but I didn't know you actually tried to kill yourself. Hard to believe Bender talked you out of it."

"What? I wasn't trying to kill myself. We didn't have Suicide Booths back in the 20th century so I thought it was a telephone. I was trying to call the Professor. Bender was the one trying to kill himself. He said something about a twofer and I panicked when it tried to kill us and sorta saved our lives. We went out for a drink afterward and I asked him not to kill himself so we could be friends."

"Oh." Leela stopped to consider this. "I'd still like to kick him a few times."

Fry shrugged. "Eh, that's nothing new. Go for it."

–

"Hiii-YAH!"

"Comin' through!" Benders head shouted as it sailed past the conference table towards the far end of the hanger. Fry continued chewing his breakfast cereal unfazed. Moments later Leela settled into the chair next to him and poured out her own bowl of breakfast.

"Feel better?" he asked.

"_Slightly_," Leela answered. "But what about you, Fry?"

"I dunno." Fry avoided meeting the sympathetic look she was giving him. An outside observer could be forgiven for thinking that his breakfast was the most fascinating thing in the universe to him. The pair of them continued eating in silence as the rest of the team filtered in. Amy, Hermes and Zoidberg all gave good mornings that were met by total indifference from Fry and caustic glares from Leela. At long last the Professor shuffled his way into the room and took his seat at the table.

"Good news, everyone! Today you'll be making a delivery to the planet Fluorgus 10, home of the gigantic, fang-filled worm people."

"Uh, Professor," Hermes interrupted. "That was _yesta'days_ delivery."

"...Ewha...? Oh, well, then good news, everyone! The money from that delivery has put me in such a good mood that I won't be sending any of you to your deaths today."

"Woohoo!" Amy cheered. One of Benders arms paused in inch-worming its way by the table to liberate the rejoicing interns wallet then resumed its journey towards Benders head while she was still distracted.

"Oh well," Hermes sighed. "I suppose I shouldn't expect to fill out death certificates every day."

"Now that doesn't mean any of you get to slack off," the Professor resumed. "I'm much, much too old to put up with anyone having fun. Now get off my lawn and back to work!"

As their coworkers dispersed Leela grabbed Fry by the wrist and pulled him out of his chair to follow the Professor.

"Professor," she called after him. "I need to ask you about Fry."

"Fry...? Oh, yes, the brain thing," the mad scientist drew his gizmometer from a surprisingly deep pocket and waved it carelessly around Fry's head. "My God!"

"What's wrong?" Leela demanded.

"Nothing at all! Fry's brain is almost completely healed."

"Wait, you said that was the whole point," Fry said. "Why are you surprised?"

"Surprised by what?"

"Oh forget it," Leela cut in. "When can he take it off?"

The Professor gave the device a few further waves and scrutinized the display. "Tomorrow."

Fry's spirits took another downward plunge. "Are you sure? I mean, you made it sound like my brain was really screwed up before. Maybe a few extra days would be a good idea?"

The Professor rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Hmm... I suppose you may have a point but a gun would be faster."

"Okay then, just to be safe I'll keep it on for- wait, what?"

"What do you mean?" Leela asked.

"Weren't you listening you mouth breathing simpletons?" the Professor snapped. "That hat was designed for a perfectly healthy monkey brain, not a diseased lump of defective neurons like yours. If you wear it too long your brain will start to become dependent on it. If you delay taking it off you'll never be able to function without it again. Eventually your brain will require more and more stimulation to remain active until it exceeds the hats maximum output. Your synapses will collapse, leaving you a brainless sack of highly marketable organs."

"You mean this thing will kill him? Why didn't you tell us this before!?" Leela demanded.

"What did you think was going to happen!?" the Professor shot back. "You young upstarts always think you can just play around with my inventions then you blame ME when they kill some or all of you? I've had it! If anyone intelligent needs me I'll be in the Angry Dome!"

With that the Professor shuffled off, leaving Fry and Leela standing outside his laboratory alone.

"That senile old lunatic," Leela hissed through clenched teeth. "How could he just leave something like that out?"

Fry stared at the Professors retreating back in silence. He was experiencing a rather odd feeling at the moment. In hindsight he wasn't truthfully shocked that the hat was bad for his brain considering the fact that it'd already put him into a coma. He also wasn't surprised that the nascent plan he'd been building up around keeping the hat on permanently was getting a wrench thrown in it. What _was_ surprising him right now was that he expected being smart would make him less prone to ignoring the prospect of death.

So why was he still thinking about keeping the hat?


	6. Chapter 6

**I extend my usual gratitude towards those who reviewed my last chapter. Always appreciated. As to the statement that it was surprising that Fry didn't throw any punches or anything, Fry isn't exactly himself right now.**

**Also, fair warning, I may have to up the rating in a couple of chapters. I don't plan anything more than what Futurama normally shows but the restrictions mention "adult themes" and I really don't know where that particular line is drawn. Better to play it safe if things pan out the way they seem to be going in my head.**

**In the meantime, thanks for reading. Any and all feedback is still welcome.**

* * *

Fry and Leela were lounging on the couch in the Planet Express lounge, neither of them particularly paying attention to whatever mindless thing was playing on TV beyond occasional glances at it while reaching for another chip. Leela stretched out her leg and deftly plucked one from the bowl, dipped it and popped it into her mouth. It was a familiar and comfortable scene they'd played out many times before. If only she could keep her eye from wandering back to that damned hat.

Leela clenched her jaw and turned the page of her magazine, willing herself not to look at it again. Every time she did she had to fight a powerful desire to crush the lousy thing with her bare hands and free Fry from it forever. Tomorrow wasn't soon enough, she wanted that thing off of him _now_.

She'd been ready for a fight this morning. She had been sure that Fry would be angry and ready to beat some apologies out of the others. At the very least she'd expected shouting or a flipped table or _something_. Instead all she got out of him was a muted indifference. Or maybe it was more like resignation. It wasn't right. Certainly he'd never been as prone to violence as she was but he wasn't exactly the Dali Lama either. It was as though he just couldn't muster the energy to be angry and had given up trying.

With an unpleasant jolt she realized she was staring at the hat again and forced her eye back down to the magazine. If Fry had noticed her rudeness he gave no sign of it. He was still reading his comic book and not in the fake 'staring at the same page for five minutes way' he'd done with the menu. He actually seemed to be reading it like a normal person would, cover to cover with no difficulty. Typically he'd have to flip back and forth between pages a few times before he'd move on. It wasn't as though he was illiterate (though he did have to ask her about words from time to time) he just needed the repetition to make each panel sink in past the barrier of his poor attention span.

In a weird way it was actually a nice change. She still wanted the old Fry back but there was no denying his learning disability was something he struggled with. It made her feel guilty to be so eager to take away all the benefits he was experiencing because of her selfish insecurity. But, then, it wasn't just that anymore, was it? The hat _needed_ to come off tomorrow or it would kill him, simple as that. That was a perfectly legitimate reason that had nothing to do with her.

She ate another chip and chewed more violently than was strictly necessary. What was she so worried about anyway? It _was_ Fry after all. The guy who chased her for years trying to get a date. No matter how many other people she dated or how many horrible mutant abnormalities he found out about Fry had remained annoyingly persistent.

More than one guy had been driven off by something as minor as her elbow talons. Fry was the _only_ guy who wasn't even put off by the egg thing. And sure, he'd screamed when he saw her fully squidified body the first time but he'd gotten over it quickly. Hell, the horribly disgusting (yet sweet and meaningful) night they'd spent together in Zoidberg's and Farnsworth's bodies should have been enough to convince her that he wasn't _just_ in love with her body by itself but a lifetime of rejection and revulsion made for some hard to break mental habits.

But then again, that was regular Fry. _Stupid_ Fry. What was _smart_ Fry thinking about her? Was he realizing just how huge and hideously round her solitary eye was? Countless people without Fry's problems had recoiled in horror at the sight of it before and now Fry was just like them. Would he avoid her eye the next time they spoke? Would he give her elbows a wide berth when they walked next to each other? Would he shudder in disgust the next time he looked at an egg or a squid? Would he ask why she didn't dye her hair? What if he decided she was too nosy, bossy and angry? What if he didn't go all the way back to normal? What if he noticed all these things now and remembered them even after losing the extra intelligence?

Leela turned the next page too hard, ripping it clean out. She was being stupid. He'd said he loved her a million and one times. He'd tried sacrificing his life for her more than once. He was _Fry._ He wasn't going to break off their whatever-it-was just because of a few normal thoughts. The torn out page crumpled in her fist.

He wouldn't do that. Not him, not ever. She didn't care _what_ she believed right now, she was wrong and was going to have to deal with that.

Fry wasn't going anywhere and that was the end of it.

–

The comic book was just not getting through to him. Fry turned the page anyway, abandoning any attempt at comprehension and just let his eyes focus in the general direction of the pictures.

Tomorrow. It kept popping up like ads on the Internet, demanding his attention like a screaming hell-bat. Tomorrow he'd be an idiot again. Tomorrow he'd be back to being the guy everyone laughed at behind his back for being beyond stupid. The worst part was that tomorrow... tomorrow he wouldn't even understand what that meant anymore. Not for long enough stretches to _do_ anything about it, anyway. Bender would steal his money and they'd all have a big laugh at him about it right up until Fry wanted to do something nice for Leela and realized he was broke again. And Leela...

Oh god, Leela. Leela was so far out of his normal self's league it wasn't funny. She was the intelligent, strong, drop dead gorgeous woman of the 31st century, how could anyone resist her? How many women could beat the crap out of a robot? How many would stand up to an army of liquid people to save the neck of a guy who had been so thoughtless to her only hours before? And how many of them could actually pull it off, scale the side of the palace and then have the solution to saving his life?

Ships computer goes insane? Leela shuts it down. About to crash into a planet because Zapp Brannigan had locked the autopilot? Leela knew what to do. Who could have known Bender would get so upset about him moving out? Leela had. Who would ever possibly trust him even when he was working for a man who was trying to explode an entire star? Nobody but Leela.

The fact that she was a few notches above hot on top of all that was a bonus. An _incredible_ bonus but still just icing on the cake. Even after Mom had given Leela the cure for squidification it had taken her more than a week to revert all the way to normal. It'd been weird and left him covered in sucker marks but all he had needed to do was take one look into her beautiful eye to know there was nowhere else he'd rather be.

The sound of tearing paper jarred his attention away from how far above him Leela was. He looked up at the TV but it was showing a commercial for Charleston Chew. That only left Leela, who was now crumpling a torn out page in her hand. That in itself wasn't so unusual with her temper being as volatile as it was. However, normally she'd be glaring at the magazine and muttering to herself about whatever she had pissed her off, instead she was glowering into space without a sound.

Fry hadn't noticed anything happening in the last few minutes that could have set her off. He hadn't said anything stupid and, as far as Fry knew at least, Bender was still busy tracking down everything Leela had torn off that morning. The pieces fell into place in a heartbeat when he realized that the only other thing that had happened was the Professors warning.

Leela didn't want the old Fry back.

First she'd been weirded out by his change. That was a natural enough reaction though. When Fry had first seen Leela's eye he'd been startled and even a little disturbed by it. It hadn't taken him long to get past that and now he wouldn't have her any other way. Leela must have gotten used to him not being a bonehead and now she wanted him to _keep_ not being a bonehead.

He'd thought he was being careful. It hadn't taken long for him to remember the parasites and how badly that had ended. This time he'd avoided using fancy words and trying to be romantic. He hadn't tried to do things he was normally bad at like math or anything. In hindsight he probably should have tried to act more incompetent. Leela liked competence and what he'd shown during that delivery must have been enough for her to get attached. Now it was have the boyfriend she really wanted but only for a short time or put up with an idiot for years to come.

And Kirk thought _he_ had dealt with no-win scenarios. Life without Leela or death. Maybe the universe just liked to punish people who screwed with causality? It would explain how much it seemed to hate him sometimes.

–

Leela absentmindedly tightened down a lose bolt at the base of one of Bessie's lower fins with the air of someone trying to keep their hands busy. It was like living in a slightly more lucid version of _The Scary Door_. 'The day that wouldn't end!' Tomorrow felt like it was an eternity or two away and Fry was acting increasingly distant. They needed to talk but what would she say? 'I know I'm a gross mutant but please put up with it'? She needed to say _something _though. He search for ideas wasn't helped by the fact that she was distractingly hungry. Ever since she'd stolen a lunch that turned out to be one of Fry's organs she'd stopped raiding the company fridge. This would be less of a problem if hunger didn't have a way of shortening her patience.

Leela looked up from the fin to the briefing room balcony. Seeing Fry passing through the area she tossed her wrench aside and made a beeline for the stairs. Now was as good a time as any to get things sorted out.

"Fry!" she called after him right before he stepped through to the lab. He looked back and waited for her to catch up to him.

"What's up?" he asked. Leela thought his voice sounded tense, like someone bracing for an argument. Not the best sign.

"I think we need to talk," she said.

Fry sighed and gestured to the table. "You're probably right. Let's sit down." They took adjacent seats at the conference table and both waited for the other to make the first move.

"Sooo..." Fry said after nearly 30 seconds silence. "Tomorrow."

"Tomorrow," Leela echoed. Fry held her gaze for a few seconds then looked down at the table with a sigh.

"I don't think I can keep going with things," he said. "Everything feels different."

Leela felt the bottom drop out of her stomach. "Isn't that a little hasty? It's only been a few days..."

"You really think that can't change things?" Fry countered. "I can't just go back to how things were anymore."

"Why not?" Leela asked sharply. "You feel like you're too good for it now?"

Fry leaned away, apparently taken aback for a moment. The moment passed quickly however and his expression hardened.

"You know what? Maybe I _do._ Maybe I'm sick of it all. Who on Earth could blame me?"

Leela stood up. "So _that's_ how it is, huh? Do you have _any_ idea how difficult you can be to deal with? It's a full time job just keeping you _alive._"

"Well then you should be HAPPY!" Fry shouted. He stood up fast enough to knock over his chair. "Isn't this what you always wanted? I guess I should have known better. You're never happy no matter WHAT I do!"

"Oh yeah!? Well then maybe you should just give up and GET LOST!"

"FINE!" With that both of them turned their backs on each other and stormed away.

Leela strode through the building to the locker room and started digging in her locker for a photo of Fry to tape to her punching bag. Instead, on the top shelf she found her chicken hat. She yanked the stupid thing out of her locker, took hold of it with both hands fully prepared to tear it in half. She could still see Fry dancing on that table with an identical hat on in what had been one of the most humiliating displays of her life. She'd _hated_ him for it. For acting like such a primitive dolt at _Oktoberfest_ of all places.

Then she'd found his hair and clothes in that sausage and all she had wanted was to see his stupid face again.

The tension drained out of her arms, the hat still intact. Fry had told her he'd brought it back up after he'd fallen down that manhole she'd left open during her aborted attempt to move to the sewers. ...He'd been so happy to see her again in Mom's floating castle. All Leela had been was afraid of how he'd react. Afraid he'd turn his back on her forever. Now it had finally happened. It was over. Honestly and truly over.

Leela sank onto the bench, hugged the silly little hat to her chest and sniffed back tears.

"Oh god, I'm such an _idiot_..."

–

Fry stomped his way into Benders closet. He'd managed to hold onto his rage all the way home and he saw no reason to stop being furious now. The place was mercifully empty besides the usual debris he left scattered about any place he lived in long enough. Leela used to nag him about it when she came over even when he'd made an effort to clear out the living room for her. That was Leela though. Never happy about anything.

He made his way to his bedroom and flopped backward onto his mattress. A glint of purple caught his attention from the corner of his eye. His holophonor was sitting on the bedside table. Speaking of things that were never enough for Leela. It was the robot hands all over again. Give up something that made him better or pay a horrible price to keep it. He reached out for the instrument and held it up for a better look. How long had he been practicing it to impress her? How much money had he burned up on lessons where he was routinely bested by little kids? When he played he could still hear the music in his head, begging to be made real but never making it out. His hopes of ever playing the thing properly again were as empty as that theater had been. Dark, everyone gone... except for Leela.

"Please don't stop playing, Fry," she'd said. "I want to hear how it ends."

Fry let his arm drop to his side. He stared up at the bare ceiling and felt the anger slip through his fingers.

"What have I done...?"


	7. Chapter 7

**I'd like to extend a thank you to the solitary reviewer of the previous chapter for the feedback. Wanting to keep the hat may be stupid but even smart people can make bad choices. I figure the hat can only bring him up to average anyway.**

**I'll reiterate my warning that I think I'll need to upgrade the rating to M in a chapter or two. Nothing graphic planned of course but I prefer to err on the side of caution.**

**In the meantime thank you for reading. Feedback of any kind is always appreciated.**

* * *

Fry wandered the streets of New New York in a daze. He'd left Robot Arms when he'd noticed it was getting close to the end of the work day. He didn't feel like running into Bender should the robot decide to swing by their apartment before embarking on his nightly debauchery. No matter how many times he thought it over he couldn't tell where it'd all gone so wrong with Leela. Retracing their argument felt like walking in on a movie that was halfway over. He had been so sure she liked the new Fry but it seemed he was wrong about that. Maybe it was time to accept that she didn't like _either_ Fry. Dumped when he was dumb, dumped when he wasn't. The only version of him she'd ever really liked over the long term was Lars and, hat or no hat, Fry was no substitute for him.

What was he supposed to do? Leela was through with him, his co-workers saw him as some kind of particularly stupid house pet and he simply didn't have anyone else to turn to. He could always fall into another freezer tube for a thousand years but then what? Go through it all over again? Not an appealing concept. Besides, he'd be dead before too long anyway. The Professor hadn't been specific about time but he figured he wasn't looking at a long, fulfilling life.

Then again, he'd lost his family, his friendships and the love of the greatest woman in the universe. What exactly did he have left to lose when his life was already basically a country song?

He stopped in his tracks and looked up at the darkening sky. He must have been walking longer than he thought. The moon was already up and shining its pale light on the city. He'd spent his childhood dreaming of space, of standing on the surface of the moon. Nobody else on Earth in the 31st century really understood how he felt about it. To them it was just a hunk of rock. To him it was something magical.

After several long minutes he dropped his gaze and shrugged. "What the hell, why not?" He strode through the city with renewed purpose. If he was going to do this there were some things he was going to need.

Then he'd be off this planet forever.

–

Leela had arrived exactly when she usually did but Fry was nowhere to be found. She wasn't even sure what she would do when she saw him. There was definitely a _powerful_ desire to beat the daylights out of him on sight. However there was a feeling skulking around in some unnamed corner of her mind telling her to get the hat off of him first. She rationalized this to herself as not wanting to kick his ass until he was definitely clear of death. That might make her feel briefly guilty about it. On the other hand the thought of coming face to face with him also made her want to run crying from the room. She jumped to her feet when the conference room door finally slid open, ready to start pummeling Fry the instant his face came into view. The adrenaline spike was wasted as it turned out to be Bender.

"What's eating you, meatpile?" Bender asked. He didn't bother waiting for an answer before barreling on. "Yeah, nobody cares. So, how long you planning to keep Fry at your place?"

"What are you talking about?" Leela snapped. "Fry didn't stay with me last night."

"Oh yeah? So how come he wasn't there to bask in how great I am?"

A chill ran down Leela's spine. "Fry didn't go home last night?"

"Nope. So, you leave him somewhere? Hey, watch it!" he protested when Leela shoved him bodily out of her way to get through the door. Hermes was just checking in at the main entrance when she reached the lobby.

"Where do ya think you're goin'?"

"Have you seen Fry?"

"Afta' that shoutin' match the two of you had I'd start with da local suicide booth."

"That's _not_ funny."

"I wasn't kiddin'. Wouldn't be the first time Fry did somethin' crazy after bein' dumped. Don't worry, no deliveries today so I'll file this under your 'crew management' duties. Just let me know what kind of untimely death paperwork I need to file and we'll call it even."

Leela barely caught that last sentence before the doors slid shut behind her.

–

Leela threw open the door to Benders closet and was greeted with silence. Fry's garbage was strewn everywhere as usual and the ever present background scent of spilled beer and fossilizing pizza wafted through the air. She gamely tried to shelve her annoyance with Fry's casual disregard for recycling and started searching.

It didn't take long to confirm that Fry wasn't there. Unfortunately there was also no note, no labeled disks, no nothing. Wherever Fry had gone he clearly didn't think anyone needed to know about it even after it was too late to stop him. But did that mean that he had nothing to say or that he just hadn't made it back home at all? Leela kicked the back of Fry's couch in frustration, tipping it over with a loud thud.

"What the hell are you thinking, Fry?"

The apartment was only her first stop and it was past midnight when Leela dragged herself back to her apartment. She must have covered every square foot of the city in her search for how tired she was. Every bar they'd ever been to, the Head Museum where he had that night job, Applied Cryogenics, his old house down in the Old New York ruins, the park, little Neptune, even the museum exhibit of that pizzeria he used to work at and a dozen other places besides.

Nobody had even seen him.

It was sheer force of habit that got her to pull out her contact, brush her teeth and change into a nightgown before flopping into bed. She screwed her eye shut, willing herself not to miss having him there with her. It shouldn't have been hard to do. Fry had flat out told her he couldn't stand being with her anymore. And yet she'd just spent her entire day trying to find him. Was she holding out some hope that he'd forget all about it when the hat came off? That it wasn't _really_ over because it wasn't _really_ Fry?

Why the hell should she care? After what he'd said what difference would it make? After all, the worms hadn't changed his feelings, why would the hat? He'd meant every word of it. Leela's hands balled into weary fists. That was it then. No more searching for Fry. He wasn't an idiot (at the moment) so if he wanted to get let his brain get barbecued that was his own problem. He wasn't a friend or co-worker with a problem that needed her supervision whether he liked it or not anymore. Let him kill himself. It wasn't her responsibility.

Maybe if she let those thoughts cycle through her head long enough they'd start to sound right.

–

Leela swatted blindly at her alarm until it shut off before she opened her eye to a bare sliver. Her first slightly blurred view of the day was of an empty stretch of mattress next to her. She closed it again quickly. Somewhere in the back of her mind an internal schedule reminded her that it was the weekend at last. No going to work unless the Professor specifically called everyone in to make a delivery for a client willing to cough up the weekend delivery surcharge. Would it really hurt to stay in bed a while longer? She had been up late, after all. She'd earned a little bit of sleeping in. The owner of a baritone voice had other plans.

"Are you not going to resume the search?"

Leela groaned and turned her face further into her pillow. "Go away, Nibbler."

"Negative. Fry must be found at once. It is of the greatest importance!"

"Not to me," Leela grumbled.

"This is not the time for your human self delusion. Fry's life hangs in the balance."

"Fine, then _you_ go find him." Leela rolled over, trying to recapture the feeling of teetering on the brink of sleep before it totally slipped away.

"I intend to, however there is much ground to cover and I doubt that I will be able to persuade him to return. That task will fall to you."

Leela shut her eye tighter and spoke through gritted teeth. "We're done, Nibbler. Fry doesn't care about me anymore."

"That is hard to believe," Nibbler said dismissively. "The Mighty One has long held you in the highest regard."

"The who?" Leela asked. "It's too early to be drunk, Nibbler."

"It is of no consequence and I am most certainly _not_ inebriated. Now come, we have already wasted enough time."

Leela's patience finally ran out. In a flash she was sitting up and holding Nibbler by the front of his cape so that they were nose to adorable nose.

"I. Don't. Care."

"That," Nibbler declared with an impressive degree of calm for someone in his position, "is also hard to believe."

"The next time I see him I'm going to kick his ass. He told me right to my face that he thinks he's _too good_ for me now."

Nibbler gave her a look she didn't recognize, possibly thanks to it being delivered by three eyes. "Did he? Or is that merely what you heard?"

Leela rolled her eye. "I only _heard_ what he _said._"

"Are you so certain that you're willing to throw away all hopes of getting him back?"

Leela released her grip on Nibblers cape, dropping him on her lap. "Who said I want him back? It was _mutual_." Nibbler stood and straightened his cape.

"Very well," he said gravely. "I shall continue the search on my own." He hopped down from the bed and crossed to the door. On the threshold he paused and looked back. "Consider what I have said. If Phillip J. Fry is not found quickly we shall all pay the price in time. You are angry now but you may find your choice much harder to live with once it is too late." Before Leela could reiterate just how mutual the breakup was Nibbler was gone.

She let herself fall back onto the mattress. But even when she did her best to relax her eye would not stay closed. After 10 minutes she let out a frustrated sigh and sat up again. Nibbler just had to get her angry, didn't he? Now she'd have to wait a good 16 hours before she'd be able to get back to sleep. Stupid healthy sleep cycle.

She swung her legs over the edge and rose into a stretch. Alright, so she was awake. That didn't mean she was going to go looking for Fry. She was just going to run through her morning routine and then spend the rest of the day in her usual post ditching/getting ditched routine. She might have to make a quick trip out for ice cream but otherwise her time was going to be split between some quality time with her TV and her punching bag.


	8. Chapter 8

**NOTE: The next chapter will be increasing the rating to M just to be safe. I'll update the description with a warning as well.**

**On to the usual business. Thanks to the reviewers of the last chapter, the feedback is appreciated as always. At least one question gets answered in this chapter.**

**I've seen the last episode of course. In terms of time lets just say this takes place between the final two episodes. Sad to see the show go, of course, but we've been here before. Maybe we'll be here again someday. Until then thanks for reading and I welcome any feedback you may have.**

* * *

Fry took a few steps back to admire his work. It had cost him just about all the money he'd earned in his tip but it was worth it. Enough supplies to last a couple of weeks, air recycling system, portable air tanks and a self contained environment to house it all. The space tent was more like a large plastic and metal igloo than anything else. Roomy, very space age-y and complete with windows. It hadn't even been that hard to set up while wearing the somewhat bulky space suit he'd bought. In fact his only complaint was that it'd taken several trips to get everything there from Earth. After being denied a car rental from several different companies he'd resorted to ordering one of those space wagons that Cubert and Dwight had used when they founded Awesome Express.

It'd been a pain to pedal it up and back so many times with so much weight but the whole thing had actually been a great experience. He'd ordered it, got the supplies and put it together by himself without any problems. While the old Fry would never have been able to do it the _new_ Fry did it in only a couple of hours. _He_ had done all of this. Stupid, useless Fry had done this. It felt... good.

He turned on the spot to let his eyes take in the glorious grays of the surrounding landscape. Every plain of dust, every jagged rock, all of it just as incredible as he remembered. Now he had the time to enjoy it. His relaxing view was disrupted when he came around to face the blue green planet hanging over the horizon. When he raised his hand he could pinch the image between his thumb and forefinger. From here the whole world was smaller than the palm of his hand. He couldn't even see New New York.

He turned his back on the sight and stepped into the tents airlock. By the time he saw that city again it'd be too late to take it back. Old Fry would be gone forever.

...Good riddance.

–

Leela drove her fist into Fry's stupid smile for what felt like the thousandth time.

Three days. He'd been gone for three days and nobody had so much as heard from him. At this rate Leela was going to wear out her punching bag. She'd already gone through four different pictures of Fry and half a roll of tape thanks to the need for frequent reattaching. She was worried about him and that pissed her off to no end. How _dare_ he make her worry about him? When she found him she was going to break his damned legs to stop him ever running off like this ever again.

Two left jabs, right cross, left hook, right hook and a spinning kick that tore Fry's picture clean off the side of the bag. Leela glared down at the battered photo as though she could make it burst into flames with sheer rage. Why hadn't she just kept her mouth shut? If she hadn't forced the issue Fry might not have left. She could have stayed with him to make damn sure he didn't slip away before the hat came off. They'd probably still be through but at least her best chance of seeing him again wouldn't be someone finding his corpse and calling up the Professor to identify the body.

Leela gave the bag another vicious punch. She wasn't _supposed_ to want to see him again. She was supposed to be furious with him for what he'd said to her. How could she be anything else? It was one of the worst betrayals he could have done. To think she'd almost believed him when he insisted that he loved her, mutations and all. How could she have been so stupid?

The one bright side was that he was no big loss. It's not as if he'd been some incredibly handsome, charming and successful pillar of masculinity. He was lazy, unmotivated, out of shape, ignorant, pasty, careless, carefree, friendly, sweet, enthusiastic, devoted... Leela gave the bag another kick. Alright, maybe she _had_ lost a few things. She turned away from the bag and started to unwind the protective wraps from her hands. Fry's few good points couldn't make up for all the trouble he caused her. Regardless, while it was completely and entirely mutual he'd still started the end of their whatever-it-was. _Too good._ Too good for _her_. She spun on the spot and kicked the bag _hard_. The straps connecting the bag to the mount gave out under the force from this proverbial last straw, letting the bag slam freely into the wall.

Leela stooped down to check the tag. Sure enough, the warranty had expired last week. She sighed heavily and headed to the showers.

–

It was day five of what Fry was calling his 'retirement'. He'd been on the moon three of those days and nobody had found him yet. That was one of the reasons he'd picked the moon. Sure, he could have run further but there was really no need. There wasn't a single person he knew in the 31st century who would even think to check the moon, especially in the middle of the nowhere. This was doubly true since he was all but certain that nobody would even be looking for him at all.

He tried not to think about that.

Instead he focused on the book he was reading. All his life he'd found reading most books to be a chore, especially the educational ones. Given the circumstances he figured that now was as good a time as any to do something new, something totally un-Fry. The last items he'd collected for his supplies had been books and videos. He'd probably learned more about the world of the 31st century in the last few days than he had in the last 13 years. He'd even watched a documentary on Blernsball. He _still_ had no idea how it worked which, as far as he was concerned, proved that it was officially too complicated. Though the fact that he was distracted by memories of going to games with Leela and the others may have played a part.

That was just about the only problem with his retirement. He could eat whatever he wanted with no chance of nagging. He could lounge in his underpants at all hours of the day and take naps whenever he felt like it. It was practically a never ending bachelors weekend, something he'd used to enjoy. It was just that somewhere along the line being a bachelor had started to lose its appeal.

With every hour that slipped by without any sign of her a dismal feeling grew in the pit of his stomach. When he opened his eyes after a nap without a kick in the ribs to find nobody standing over him, glaring down at him ready to ask what the hell he'd been thinking the feeling got worse. Even now as he watched the seconds tick their way past 3:59 he found himself hoping that this would be it. This would be the hour that someone, _anyone_ knocked on that airlock door.

A shadow passed over the tent. Fry looked up through the skylight window but saw only space. Just some traffic passing by off the main lanes. Nothing to do but sigh, toss the book aside, push the button on the remote and watch the next video.

Maybe something would happen at 5.

–

Five days and still no sign of Fry or Nibbler. Leela's apartment hadn't seemed so empty in years. Neither had her life, for that matter. Not since her days at Applied Cryogenics had existence felt quite so... flat. Like a soda left open on the counter all day her life had lost something and now nothing about it tasted right. Worst of all it was making her melodramatic.

And of course, there was Zoidberg.

Leela had long ago gotten used to the fact that Amy, in her infinite sluttiness, had better luck with men than she did. Later on her relationship with Kif had become arguably as stable as Hermes' marriage when you factored in LaBarbara's tendency to wind up with Barbados Slim when something happened to her husband. As for her other co-workers Bender simply didn't give much of a damn so long as he had access to hooker bots and the Professor was so old it just didn't matter.

Zoidberg was another matter. The hideous and foul-smelling crustacean had failed to win a mate even during his species horribly disgusting mating frenzy. He'd been miserably lonely for as long as Leela had known him. It could not possibly be overstated how repulsive his stench was. He could knock flies off a dumpster at half a mile and then make a hearty meal from contents of said dumpster.

Right now even _he_ had a better love life than Leela. Either through sheer force of her affection for the doctor or some mistake he'd made when connecting her new nose's scent receptors to her brain, Marianne was still head over heels for Zoidberg. It was weird, incomprehensible, disgusting and undeniably sweet. The two of them were happy together. What difference did anything else make?

The silence of her apartment was driving Leela insane. With nothing better to do she strapped on her boots and strode out the door. She didn't have a particular destination in mind, deciding to just walk until she was tired enough to go home and fall into bed. With luck she'd manage to find some section of the city that wouldn't remind her of Fry every few seconds.

When a shadow swept over Leela she ignored it without question. Such things hardly registered when you spent your life in a city full of flying cars and pedestrian propelling tubes. It was this ingrained attitude that left her oblivious to the shadow making a u-turn for a second pass. Again she paid its passage no mind. The empty Slurm can that landed squarely on her head was another matter.

"Ow! Hey!" Leela looked up to find the wise guy who was asking for a free tooth removal. The windows above were all closed and dark. The only thing she found to direct her glare at was the moon. Even after all these years Fry still had a soft spot for that lifeless rock. She'd found him on the Planet Express balcony more times than she could count just staring up at it. She wouldn't be surprised if he tried to move there one day.

Leela's train of thought screeched to a halt, jumped the tracks and burst into flames.

"Oh. My. God." The next second she was sprinting into a tube. "Planet Express building!" It was so obvious. Where _else_ would Fry have possibly gone? She couldn't believe she hadn't thought of it sooner. The moon may just be the moon to her but to Fry it was a life long dream and she was going to drag him away from it before "life long" lost all meaning for him.

After she hit him a few times that is. Just a few solid slaps before she brought him back. She had earned at least that much.

–

"The final death toll for the Interplanetary Bean Bag championship came in at a mere 73, the lowest in three centuries. Morbo hopes for a better result next year to aid in the swift extermination of the human vermin."

"Ahahahaha... Don't forget to tune in tonight at 11 when we'll be sitting down at a round table with Hedonism Bot, General Extermulo and a vat of sentient silicone gel to get their views on immigration reform."

Fry shut the TV off and stretched out on his back. The news was kind of depressing when he was smart enough to really think about the implications. He was already depressed enough without seeking out more reasons to add to the pile. Space stared back down at him. One thing he couldn't get used to about the moon was how quiet it was. Nothing moved out there. Hardly any ships flew past this far from the park and there weren't even any space rednecks for several miles at the closest. He yawned widely and scratched around the base of the hat. He was just starting to nod off when the stars were blotted out by an electric mucus colored wall. He sat bolt upright and scrambled over to a window. Bessie swung around in a wide arc and landed about half a mile distant.

It could only be Leela. Nobody else parked that far away.

Leela had come to find him. She had actually come to find him. The question was: why? What was she going to do? His question was answered several minutes later when Leela reached the tent and got through the airlock. She stood there, framed by the inner door, just as beautiful as ever. She took off her helmet and held it under her arm but said nothing. The two of them simply stood there in silence, staring at one another.

"Uh... Hi," Fry said awkwardly. Before he could think to say anything else the sight of Leela's face was replaced by the sight of Leela's fist.


	9. Chapter 9

**Wow, it's been a lot longer than I thought. Time flies when your life descends into panic. I actually finished writing this a while back and it's just taken me this long to remember to post it. I would like to thank those of your who reviewed the last chapter and indicated that more was desired. I hope this chapter isn't too much of a disappointment.**

* * *

Leela stood over Fry with folded arms.

"You've had that coming all week," Leela said. Fry grumbled indistinctly, rubbing his face as he sat up. Leela's scowl deepened when he didn't meet her eye. Too good to even make contact with her now?

"I didn't think you'd find me," Fry said.

"You didn't make it easy," Leela snapped. "I searched the city rooftop to sewer trying to find you." Fry looked up at her but his expression wasn't what she expected. He looked more surprised than anything.

"Why?"

Now it was Leela's turn to look away. "I gave up after a day." She was angry and meant those words to sting. Fry didn't bite.

"But why did you look at all?" he asked, climbing to his feet. "I thought you didn't want to see me anymore."

"I _don't_. Not after what you said."

"After what _I_ said?" Fry protested hotly. "What about what you said? First you want me to be smart then you don't, then you do _and _don't. No matter who I am or what I do you dump me!"

"What are you talking about?" Leela demanded. "I never said anything like that! And don't try to deny what _you_ said. You said you couldn't go on with me anymore, remember? You said you were _too good_ for me!"

"What!? No I didn't!"

"I heard you say it! 'I can't go back to how things were anymore. Who on Earth would blame me?' All these years and you turn out just like everyone else!"

"That's not what I meant!" Fry insisted.

"Oh sure," Leela said sarcastically. "It's not my eye, you're just late getting somewhere. My hair isn't weird but you know a great stylist who can dye it. Just admit it. You can't stand the idea of being with the mutant anymore."

"Why would you even think that? You're Leela!"

"Was that supposed to mean something, Fry? You _are_ still wearing the hat, right?"

"It means you're amazing," Fry said as earnestly as he could manage. "It means you're smart and beautiful and strong and dangerous and love animals and always know how to fix things." He reached out to grab her shoulders and held on all the tighter when she tried to pull away. "It means you're the best captain ever and... it means I love you."

Leela's throat had gone dry. She'd heard him say that so many times before but rarely with such conviction. He was looking her straight in the eye like he always had in the past. He wasn't recoiling or retching or looking for escape routes or anything.

"Then what-?"

"I was talking about everything else. Being a moron who always screws things up." Fry released her shoulders and crossed the window looking out toward Earth. "I thought you were tired of me. It seems like I'm always finding some way to make you mad or get you killed or something. I thought that if I kept the hat... maybe you'd be happier. Maybe you'd like me more and not die."

"I was so sure..." Leela said absently. "I mean, you were at least as smart as _most_ of the other guys I've dated so I thought you saw me the way they did."

"Hell no! I love you. I-mph! Mmmm..." Whatever Fry had been about to say was lost to the kiss Leela had locked his lips with. It felt like a breath of fresh air after being buried alive. Leela had come to find him and now she was kissing him. Did this mean she wanted him again? He had no idea how long they stood that way before she finally pulled back.

"Oh, Fry, I can't believe how wrong my interpretation of your poorly chosen words was when I viewed them in light of my lifetime of experience." Fry felt like he should say something dramatic in response. Something deep and meaningful ought to do the job. Something that expressed how horrible he felt about what had happened and how much he still loved her.

Perhaps it was a sign that the hat was starting to fail him when all he could think of was: "Can we kiss again?"

To his surprise Leela didn't seem to mind. If anything the next kiss was even better than the first. He was on the moon and kissing the greatest woman in the universe. Now he was flat on his back and being straddled by said greatest woman while she was still kissing him. _On the moon._ He couldn't imagine how his day could get any better.

–

"Oh _man_," Fry sighed. Leela made a vague sound of agreement. The interior of the space tent was littered with various articles of clothing, not all of which belonged to Fry. Fry had actually happened to be fully dressed when Leela had arrived and Leela had just thrown on a space suit over her usual outfit before leaving the ship. The only thing she couldn't spot from her current position was her top. Thankfully it couldn't have gone to far in the environmentally sealed bubble.

The best part about breaking up with Fry was the making up that came when they got back together. She'd honestly expected to be disappointed with Fry the first time she'd taken him home. He was a clumsy idiot, after all. And in truth he _had_ started out being rather mediocre in an objective sense (which still beat out Zapp and Alcazar so that had been something). But even though his hands lacked fine motor control Fry brought something to the table no other man ever had. He was, for lack of a better word, grateful.

Fry didn't just get it over with, roll over and fall asleep. He treated her like he'd been granted some kind of rare privilege. Every time they were together like this he seemed determined to make sure she wouldn't regret her choice in the morning. It was as though he believed she could easily do better than him and would do anything to make sure she was satisfied with slumming it.

"Is it possible to make something a goal in life if you didn't know you wanted it until it happened?" Fry asked. "Because you and me on the moon really should have been on the list."

"It _was_ good," Leela agreed.

"Wanna go again?" Fry asked hopefully. Leela was half way to saying yes before her brain finished reengaging. What was she thinking? There wasn't time for this, Fry's life was still at stake. She pulled herself free of Fry's arms and sat up.

"We can't. We need to get you back to the Professor, remember?"

"Oh. Yeah. The hat." Fry reached up absently to touch the tiny device. "...Right."

Leela paused refastening her bra and shot Fry a look. "The hat is coming off."

"But what if it's too late? What if I already screwed up my brain?"

"Come on, Fry. What are the odds that it's something the Professor can't fix?" When Fry did not appear to be comforted by this she switched tacks. "Look, we won't find out sitting around here. We'll go have your brain looked at then we can decide what to do, okay?"

Fry nodded and started gathering up some clothes.

–

"What do you think you're doing!? I demand you return my ship at once!" the Professor shouted.

"I just _did_," Leela said exasperatedly.

"That's not my ship." Leela reached out and adjusted the focus on the Professors glasses. "Ah, there you are Bessie, old girl. I've got some new lasers to install-"

"Professor, I need you to examine Fry's brain. Quickly."

"Eh-whuaa...? Fry? Are you still wearing that hat you imbecile!? I told you not to keep it on too long!"

Fry opened his mouth but Leela talked over him. "Can't you take it off him?"

"Hmm... I suppose it might still be possible. Though I am already in my pajamas... Ooohf!" Leela shoved the frail scientist towards the stairs.

In a few short minutes the three of them, along with a visibly disgruntled-at-being-called-in-so-early Amy, were gathered around the lab table once more as the Professor inspected Fry's brain.

"Where the spleck did you find him, Leela?" Amy asked.

"The moon."

"Seriously? I thought you already looked there."

"Well I didn't," Leela said shortly.

"Wait, you thought I'd be on the moon?" Fry asked.

"Spluh, where else do you even know about?"

"Bad news, everyone," the Professor announced grimly before anyone could say more. "As I expected Fry's brain has started becoming dependent on the cognitive radiation generated by the hat."

"Is it too late?" Leela asked. "Can he recover if you take it off?"

"There's no way to know. He might be able to get over it or he could be permanently brain damaged. Even if some sort of recovery _is_ possible there's no telling how long it would take or how complete it would be." He turned to Fry. "If we take the hat off now you may never be yourself again."

Fry swallowed nervously. Leela clenched her fists. "Is there an alternative?" she asked.

"Of course there's an alternative," the Professor said as though it were obvious. "We shoot him now and start harvesting his-"

"Just take the hat off," Leela interrupted.

"Very well. Amy, get the involuntary adherence module neutralizer."

Amy stifled a yawn, pulled open a drawer and after a few seconds of rummaging handed a silvery, pen-shaped device over to the Professor. The Professor twisted various segments of the device until a tiny point of red light blinked on at the tip.

"Now lay back and hold still," the Professor commanded. Fry stretched out hesitantly on the table. As the Professor started lining up the device precisely at the right angle to the hat Fry spoke up.

"Leela? In case this doesn't work... I'm sorry about all this. And I lo-"

The rest of Fry's sentence was drowned out by a sound equal parts demonic foghorn and lightning strike when the neutralizer unleashed a pillar of red light as broad as a redwood that cast the lab in a hellish glow. The beam blasted out through the window and into the dawn sky, shattering the glass and melting a hole in the metal framework.

"There we go," the Professor said casually once the light faded. He wedged the neutralizer under the brim of the hat and, with noticeable effort, popped it off Fry's head.

The effect was immediate and violent. Fry jerked like someone had just jammed a live power line down his throat. It was only Leela's quick intervention that stopped him falling off the table. A series of smaller spasms wracked his limbs, resulting in several wild kicks to Leela's side as she wrestled him back onto the table. Gradually he stilled enough for Leela to release her death grip.

"Fry? Can you hear me?" Fry said nothing. His mouth was ajar, his eyes open but unfocused and his body going limp one muscle group at a time. "Fry? Fry!?" A faint gurgle from the back of his throat was Fry's only answer.

"Maybe we should get him to a doctor," Amy said.

"Did someone call for a doctor?" Zoidberg asked, sticking his head in through the door.

"I'll call an ambulance," Amy amended.

"Aww..."


End file.
